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Choosing an Antenna.

First of all you do not need some fancy “HDTV” antenna, all tv antennas are HD ready. Actually, I have found that the best antenna I have used so far is on top of my grandparents house and it is about thirty years old. The cheapest antenna solution is what I am currently using in my office and that is a paper clip placed into the antenna connection on my Vizio flat screen and it works amazingly well – yes, I said paper clip. You can also try rabbit ears which will be efficient in most urban environments and better than the more expensive amplified antennas which seem to be less efficient.

Antenna Placement.

If you are in the middle of a large metro area give the paper clip method a try and if that doesn’t work upgrade to rabbit ears. If you are looking for a more aesthetic solution you can place a VHF/UHF antenna in the attic and run cable to your televisions. Placing an antenna in the attic will also probably increase the number of signals you receive, the higher you get the number of  signals that will get to you unobstructed should increase. Finally, if you are in a rural area you may need to deploy the antenna on the roof of your home and this can allow reception as far as 50 miles away.

The Next Step

Now that you have the antenna and it is hooked up to your tv you are minutes away from free HDTV. This also assumes that you have an HD ready television that is equipped with a digital tuner. Go into your settings menu and change your tuner mode from Cable to Antenna, then scan for channels. Your television will pick up analog and digital channels, the analog channels will be on channels such as 3, 4, 14, 21 and digital would appear as 4.1, 4.2, 4.3, 21.1, 21.2 and so on. The analog channels will stop broadcasting this summer. I should also note that not all programming will be HD but a lot of it is and the number of shows shooting in HD will increase over time.

The Digital TV Transition

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